Deals values have slipped 54 per cent year-onyear in February, hit by a funding winter that the start-ups faced and the absence of IPOs, Grant Thornton’s Bharat Deal Tracker shows.

The report noted that the total number of deals came down to 89 and were valued at $1.8 billion, 60 per cent lower year-on-year.

This is the second-lowest deal volume and the lowest value since 2014. Shanthi Vijetha, partnergrowth at Grant Thornton Bharat, noted that the decline in the number of deals could be due to the global macroeconomic recessionary fears.

“US economic data has been pointing towards a slowdown; however, the recession is not confirmed yet. China has seen an accelerated reopening, and that has provided a boost to the commodity market,” she explained.

“On the domestic front, the policy review also acknowledges that domestic economic activity is expected to remain resilient, aided by the sustained focus on capital and infrastructure spending in the Union budget 2023-24.” Of the total deals, M&Assaw a downtrend both in terms of volume which fell 48 per cent to 24 deals, and by 47 per cent in value clocking at $755 million compared with a year ago.

The IPO segment was the worst with just one issue of $8 million, compared with three issues raising $1 billion a year ago.

While M&As were dominated by cross-border deals, particularly outbound transactions on the back of one big-ticket transaction of $578 million, volume continued to be dominated by domestic consolidations accounting for 67per cent of transactions.

The pharma, healthcare and biotech, and IT and ITeS sectors led the deal activities with 17 per cent and 13 per cent of the volume, respectively.